Tag: Vizio

China’s conglomerate LeEco has abandoned its plans to buy US telly maker Vizio for $2 billion.

The move was announced last year and would have given LeEco a foothold in the Land of the Fee. The company wants to expand its business beyond Chinese market.

Now it seems that the deal has folded due to “regulatory headwinds.”
In a statement, the companies said:”We continue to believe that there is great synergy between the two companies, and are pleased to announce that LeEco and Vizio have reached an agreement that is a win for both companies … LeEco and Vizio will continue to explore opportunities to incorporate the Le app and content within the Vizio connected CE platform, and engage in a collaborative partnership to leverage LeEco’s ecosystem user interface platform, along with the brand’s exclusive content and distribution channels, to bring Vizio products to the China market.”

However there could be other reasons both companies have been getting bad news lately. LeEco is struggling financially and earlier this month it was reported that the company had delayed payroll for its US employees. Vizio was fined the company $2.2 million by the FTC to settle a case involving the TVs’ data collection techniques.

The battle for the top spot in the AmericanLCD–TV market is hearing up according to market research firm iSuppli.

The company said that the competition heated up in the second quarter as the gap in market share between current leader Samsung Electronics and second place Vizio closed, leaving just one percent between the two.

In the second quarter Samsung held a 0.7 percentage point lead over Vizio in the U.S. LCD-TV shipment war, compared to 1.3 points in the first quarter. It said both companies in the second quarter dramatically outperformed the overall market by offering sets with advanced features desired by US consumers.

US LCD-TV shipments rose by 12.8 percent in the second quarter to 7.36 million units, up from 6.53 million in the first quarter, according to the company.

Samsung’s shipments grew at more than twice the pace of the overall market, rising by 26 percent to 1.45 million units, up from 1.15 million in the first quarter. However, Vizio grew even faster, with its shipments rising by an “industry-leading” 30.8 percent to 1.39 million units, up from 1.07 million in the first quarter.

iSuppli said that in the past the the two companies had taken two different strategies in a bid to gain the LCD TV market lead. Samsung focused on premium products while Vizio pushed low-cost value-oriented LCD-TVs.

iSuppli said that as U.S. consumer preferences have shifted to higher-end LCD TVs, Vizio has realigned its product line to offer more advanced features.

Riddhi Patel, a researcher at iSuppli said: “Most LCD-TVs purchased in the United States in 2010 are replacements of first-generation flat panels.

“Because of this, US consumers are more informed and demand larger LCD-TVs with better picture quality and more premium features, including 3-D, LED backlighting and built-in Internet connectivity. While Samsung continues to lead these technological trends, including the nascent 3-D TV segment, Vizio has significantly closed the feature gap.”

Positive Technologies claims it developed several methods in the field of adaptive displays used in LCD display fields “which enabled LCD displays to exhibit the response times necessary to be commercially viable for use as modern display panel technology in a variety of different products sold to consumers”.

Inventor Robert Hotto has come up with a number of ideas licensed by companies including AT&T, Apple and Toshiba, the claim said. He claims credit for the liquid crystal printer. DARPA gave him a grant of $650,000 to develop and commercialise drive controllers using his invention, but a number of companies have declined to license the patents above.

Nazomi describes itself as being founded in September 1998 by three Java technology and embedded systems veterans for the purpose of enhancing the performance of apps running on Java and other “universal runtime platforms”.

This isn’t the first time Nazomi has filed suit. We wrote in December 2009 in TG Daily that a number of companies had been sued by the firm. That case was filed in a Texas district court. We’ve no idea why such a similar suit is being filed in a different state.